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METRO VANCOUVER -- Dayhu Group executive Paul Tilbury just opened one massive new warehouse building at Boundary Bay and is set to start construction on another that hasn’t been leased, but he is already advocating for governments to free up more industrial land for Port Metro Vancouver development.

That will help renew tensions over the Agricultural Land Reserve as the province prepares to review the Agricultural Land Commission as part of its overall government core review.

“There’s got to be some real discussion about liberating land along the length of the South Fraser Perimeter Road so we can keep trucks on that road and service industry right from that road,” Tilbury said to an industry audience.

The patchwork of industrial land available throughout the ALR “makes it very difficult for us to access (the perimeter road),” he said.

The result is that major distribution centres for big-box retailers such as Walmart or Home Depot are bypassing Metro Vancouver for destinations such as Calgary or Edmonton.

Outside the session, Tilbury said he won’t be making representations to the provincial review himself, but the industry will be taking up the discussion.

Last Summer, Energy and Mines Minister Bill Bennett, the minister responsible for the provincial government’s core review, said “some sacrosanct things,” such as the ALR and its governing Agricultural Land Commission, would be considered in the review.

In subsequent interviews, Bennett said he wanted to ensure, in the Kootenays, Cariboo and northeast, that land that is marginal for agriculture could be used for the broader benefit of local economies.

However, Tilbury said, the review needs to consider Lower Mainland reserves as well. And for land that isn’t being farmed, or is unsuitable for farming, “there needs to be dialogue about whether those lands are better suited for industrial use.”

As part of that, Tilbury added, land use needs to be examined in the context of port development, the logistics of serving that development and being strategic about setting aside land that meets development needs.

The squeeze on industrial land (the vacancy rate on existing development hovers in the range of four per cent) is one of the factors putting pressure on the ALR, and one of the factors certain to face resistance from municipalities that have made commitments to preserve agricultural land.

In an interview with The Vancouver Sun last fall, Burnaby Mayor Derek Corrigan, chairman of Metro Vancouver’s planning and agriculture committee, said developers need to look at using remaining industrial land more intensively.

He added that developers have profited from converting industrial land for residential use, “now there’s significantly less available land, and the pressure, as we predicted, is going onto agricultural land.”

The Dayhu Group, a major Lower Mainland industrial landlord, just completed work on one 440,000-square-foot warehouse suitable for use as a distribution centre, and has plans to build a “mirror-image” building adjacent to it at the Boundary Bay Industrial Park. The combined development would be the equivalent of seven football fields.

It is not directly on the South Fraser Perimeter Road, but is a direct drive with only one traffic light between it and the Deltaport container terminal.

Dayhu built the first phase on spec, but Tilbury said they have since signed one major tenant for a large space in the building with strong interest in the rest, and for pre-leasing of the second building.

Tilbury said Metro Vancouver does have enough industrial land to meet its needs in the short term. Development such as the Tsawwassen First Nation’s 135 hectare development adjacent to Deltaport help alleviate the pressure.

However, starting in about 2022, Tilbury said, industry predictions are that the region will start running short of suitable industrial land.

Aubrey Kelly, president of the Surrey City Development Corp., said B.C. has lost a lot of business in the distribution of goods and value-added production of resources to other provinces.

He said Canada’s railways have spent billions of dollars on inland centres such as Calgary, Edmonton and Regina that allow shippers to bypass Metro Vancouver, so B.C. policy-makers need to do more, including reinstituting tax advantages on industrial land, to try bringing that economic impact back.

“If we don’t figure out how to still add value to that process, we’ll be left to the status of just being a toll booth for Alberta,” he said.

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